


Shadows of Virtue

by Daegaer



Category: RH Plus (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Vampires, Vigilantism, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2008
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-05 16:45:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/408681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/pseuds/Daegaer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Michitaka finds himself imprisoned.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shadows of Virtue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [treneka](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=treneka).



> Thank you to my beta readers, Puddingcat and Tosca!

 

 

_"If you are ever in any trouble, remember, tell Kiyoi. He'll help you."_

"Father says Kiyoi is a terrible person, Grandfather. He says he's a monster."

"Hah. Your father says a lot of things, Michitaka. Most of them aren't worth listening to. You listen to me _. Trust Kiyoi, he won't let you down."_

" - not to mention the angle the _tabloids_ are taking on this whole debacle. We can't even sue them, it'll only fuel the scandal . . . Michitaka! Are you listening to me?"

Michitaka looked up from his folded hands and met his father's eyes. 

"Yes, Father," he said. "You were talking about the tabloids' stories about me using my vigilante organization's influence not to chase and catch perverts, but to seduce credulous young people for _my_ perverted pleasure."

It was no pleasure at all to see his father reduced to helpless silence. Michitaka looked down again at his hands and busied himself tugging the sleeves of his blue prison uniform down a little further over his wrists. They were just slightly too short, and made him feel ridiculous. The whole situation was ridiculous. He still couldn't quite believe it was real.

"What were you _thinking?_ " his father said, sounding hopeless and suddenly old.

"Should a serial rapist be let go free just because he's got relatives in the Ministry of Finance?" Michitaka said. "I have to admit, I didn't expect him to be able to pull in this sort of favour from the police. I suppose our investigation could have been more thorough."

"I meant, why did you ever think of vigilantism?" his father said.

"Grandfather said -"

"Your grandfather! I should have known! Why that man felt the need to meddle in your life -"

" _That man?_ He was your father!"

"Him and his _stupid_ stories! Look what they've led you to!"

Michitaka leant forward. "Father, please, there may be someone who can help. Grandfather's friend Kiyoi -"

"Don't say that name to me!" 

His father shot up from his chair, pacing back and forth as if he'd somehow manage to walk off hearing the name. Michitaka waited silently. There was no good trying again; he remembered himself as a boy, wide-eyed at the rages his father had gone into whenever Kiyoi's name was mentioned. Grandfather had provoked the rages more than once, he realized. He must have found them amusing. Now, his father paused, ran his hands through his hair, and tried to compose himself.

"I'm so disappointed in you, Michitaka," he said. "I thought you were a good son."

"I'm sorry," Michitaka said. "I really am, Father. Will Mother be able to come with you next time?"

"You've broken your mother's heart," his father muttered. "I don't think she can bear to see you." Michitaka clenched his fists under the table. Father was just trying to air his frustrations, he thought. Mother would never - He wondered if too much had shown on his face then, as his father looked away and cleared his throat then went on quickly, "Anyway, we've been told that you won't be allowed more family visits before the trial. Your lawyer is the only one who will be allowed to see you."

Michitaka nodded, and watched his father wearily walk away. He stared at the floor as he was taken back to his cell, and lay on his bunk, trying not to think. Another petty victory for his erstwhile target. The trial would be a farce; it was useless to think his lawyer could actually _help_ him. He covered his face with his hands and knew he'd been a fool to bother with a case of anything less than murder. It took bodies showing up before the courts would dare to touch any case involving government ministers' relatives. Some of the victims had been pressured to become character witnesses for the very man who raped them, his lawyer had told him. It was grotesque. It was easier, more comprehensible, to be able to feel compassion for their plight than fully to comprehend that he was facing charges of kidnapping, assault and operating a criminal organization. _I clean things up_ , he thought. _I'm not like the bastards we catch_. He tried not to remember the scene when he'd shown up to take the target into custody. They'd found him with a victim, Kiyoi had explained, and Masakazu had lost his temper. Michitaka sighed. It was a wonder he wasn't being charged with murder. Come to that, it was a pity Masakazu had been stopped. Dead men didn't bring criminal charges.

He rolled over and went to sleep.

* * *

The first attempt on his life came the next day. A mild-mannered inmate, one he'd let get in line ahead of him at lunch time, came at him as he stood morosely by himself in a corner of the exercise yard. Michitaka wasted a precious moment fixated on the spoon in the man's hand, its handle honed to a stiletto point, thinking, _I passed him that in the dining room_ , then aimed a kick at the man's wrist. It had been a long time since he'd been in a karate class, but it had seemed more than his assailant had expected from him. Michitaka turned and fled into the centre of the yard, disrupting a game of five-a-side soccer.

"Sorry," he gasped, as one of the team's strikers shoved him away. "Sorry." He turned round, trying to see in all directions at once, desperate to know where his attacker was. He caught sight of the man watching him, then simply walking off, leaving Michitaka to breathe a sigh of relief amidst the witnesses that made his murder too difficult. He bent over, hands braced on his thighs, as his knees suddenly turned to water. The footballers shoved him to the side in disgust, shaking their heads as he staggered and caught himself against the wall. He stood there, solid stone at his back until the exercise period ended, and he thought he could walk again.

The second attempt was the very next morning, in the showers. Michitaka was watching for the previous day's attacker, and was taken by surprise when a different man swung him round and slammed his head against the tiled wall. He reeled back, stunned, his feet slipping on the wet floor. The man grabbed him again, trying to smash his head back onto the tiles. The other inmates studiously looked away. How many of them were in on it, he wondered, as he struggled to free himself. He wrenched himself away, and furious with fear and adrenaline, landed a solid blow on the other man. None of the others gave any indication that they saw anything, and Michitaka knew suddenly that there would be attempt after attempt till he was dead. He had no friends here, and his enemy had wealthy relatives who would be as glad as his own father to be free of the embarrassment of a trial. He had to protect himself somehow, get himself away from potential assassins. He jabbed his fingers into his attacker's eyes and as the man howled in pain, got his hands round his throat and squeezed. For a long, horrible moment he thought he'd have to kill him, then at last the others started yelling for the guards.

He felt nothing but relief when he was dragged back, but then one guard caught him across the ribs with a truncheon, making all his breath leave him at once. He couldn't breath, his diaphragm refusing to obey him, leaving him airless and panicked. The guards half-marched, half-dragged him, naked and wet, out of the showers, pausing only to fling a towel to him to wrap round his hips. He didn't bother trying to catch it, as right then his burning lungs forced him to draw in a huge, ragged, whooping breath that left him doubled over, retching with pain. He had a few terrible, wonderful seconds in which the agony was balanced by the knowledge that he wasn't going to suffocate, and then he was marched on. It was only in the infirmary that he realized there was blood running down his face from the attack. His wound was cleaned and bandaged, he was given another ill-fitting uniform and then he was put in solitary confinement as a troublemaker. 

The sound of the door closing was the most wonderful thing he'd ever heard.

* * *

Michitaka opened his eyes, still shaking from the dream in which he was held down and stabbed, over and over, his blood washing away in the shower. He had a horrible, unsettling feeling of being watched.

"You really are a troublesome person."

Michitaka sat bolt upright, staring into the dark.

"Who -"

"It's me, Mister. Kiyoi."

"Kiyoi," he said, and tried not to cry like the child he'd once been. "Don't call me that."

"Michitaka-san," Kiyoi said. "Don't be startled, I'm right by you." 

A hand touched his shoulder, then cold fingers brushed over the bandage on his head.

"What happened?"

"I got in a fight," Michitaka said. "More than one, actually. I don't think I'll be around for the trial. Solitary confinement seemed like a good idea. I can't see you at all." 

"Don't worry, I can see you," Kiyoi said. "I don't like your clothes."

Michitaka laughed, wincing as it came out more like a sob. "How did you get in?" he asked. He forced himself not to seize Kiyoi's hands.

"I can just blend into the background," Kiyoi said. It sounded like he was smiling. "The modern world is so fast-paced and rushed - people just don't pay attention to their surroundings. You don't have to worry about the cameras, you know a person like me doesn't show up very well on film."

"How did you get in _here?_ "

"I asked a guard very nicely to unlock the door - don't gape like that, it's not very polite."

Michitaka closed his mouth and rethought his assumptions on stories of vampires' powers all being exaggerations and fairy-tales. Maybe Kiyoi would turn into a giant bat next, and carry him off to freedom. He moved slightly and saw the very thinnest hint of light at the edge of the door.

"More than enough for me to see you by," said Kiyoi. 

"What if someone notices it's open? Maybe you should shut it."

"I'd like to be able to leave again; I won't be much good to you if we're both stuck in here."

"Can't you turn into mist or something, and just sort of - I don't know - filter out round the door frame or something?"

Kiyoi outright laughed. Michitaka remembered him the way he'd been when Michitaka had visited him and Grandfather. He'd wanted to see that laughter again; it didn't seem fair that he couldn't see Kiyoi at all. 

"Perhaps they do that sort of thing in Transylvania," Kiyoi said, still laughing. "I've never met anyone in Japan who did anything like that."

"There really are vampires in Transylvania?" Michitaka said.

"That's what the movies say. Have you eaten? You look hungry."

"I'm being punished for trying to strangle someone," Michitaka said, horrified at his own words. He'd tried to _strangle_ someone. He forced it from his mind. "I suppose I've been sent to bed without my supper."

"Tsk. I should have thought to bring you something. All I have are these -"

There was the sound of something being opened, and a small can was put in his hand. Michitaka drank cautiously, then gulped the tomato juice down. The second one went as quickly as the first. 

"I'm sorry, that's all."

"Thank you," he said. It struck him as funny, to have kindly vampires wanting to smuggle in food, but he didn't laugh. He might not be able to stop. "Can you take me out of here?"

There was silence, then, "I'm sorry, Michitaka-san. I don't think that would do any good. You'd just be a fugitive then, wouldn't you? An escaped prisoner - I don't see how that would improve things. I _will_ get your freedom for you; you just have to be patient."

"How? If I'm held too long I'll be murdered. They've already tried twice."

"Shh. I'll think of something. You know, in English there's a saying, _You can't teach an old dog new tricks._ "

"So?" Michitaka said, baffled.

"I am not a dog. I like new tricks."

He felt, rather than heard, Kiyoi move back, and searched for something that might delay the moment when he would be left alone in the dark once more.

"You don't sound awkward, like you usually do," he said.

"I beg your pardon?"

"You don't look at me, full on," he said. "You never look straight at me, and you usually sound stilted, awkward. You don't sound awkward now, that's all."

"Ah, Michitaka-san," Kiyoi said, right in front of him again. "I have the advantage, in the dark." Cold fingers touched his cheeks, stroking lightly over his face as if touching something utterly familiar and precious. "Go to sleep. Things will seem better in the morning."

Michitaka had no memory of lying down, none of Kiyoi leaving. He woke to find his breakfast being shoved into the cell, and ate it, alone.

* * *

"Come on, you're being moved."

Michitaka obediently stepped into the corridor, blinking at the light. He was unsure how long he had been in solitary confinement. "Please don't put me back with the others," he said, wondering if the guards had been suborned and were to be his murderers. They said nothing, just walked him along through what seemed kilometers of corridors into what, he belatedly realized, was the high security wing. They left him in a small, single-occupancy cell with featureless light-green paint on the walls and a small window, too high up to look from.

"Your lawyer has been informed of your transfer to this wing," one of the guards said as they turned to leave.

"Who else is here?" he asked.

The guard looked at him with amusement. "Terrorists and sex offenders, mostly. Don't worry, no one's allowed to socialize."

It was better than being in the featureless cell in solitary. Michitaka occupied himself by searching out every imperfection in the walls of the room, in counting the screws in the door hinges, in reveling in the sight of his dinner, when it came. The chopsticks were still flimsy and useless, but at least he didn't have to worry about appearing like a fool when they inevitably broke. The next day he was even given a book, a rubbishy paperback that had been a bestseller the year before, and that looked like everyone else in the prison had read it before it got to him, if the random scribbles of naked women in the margins with multiple layers of annotation and additions were any indication. He read it cover to cover, including the scribbles, and felt positively cheerful when he was taken to the exercise yard. He found himself alone in a small, featureless space between the angles of two wings of the prison, high walls ensuring that not a single ray of sunlight hit the ground. He stood there in confusion till a guard called to him with a rough sympathy.

"Hey! You only get half an hour per day out here - if I were you I'd start stretching my legs."

Michitaka nodded, and made himself stride back and forth till he was warmed up, then ran constrained, half-hearted laps till he was called in again. There was no point in moping, he thought. He at least appeared to be safe for the moment.

His lawyer was nonplussed by the situation.

"I can't find any reason for you to have been moved," he said. "Nothing suggesting it's for your own safety, or that you need to be in this level of security. There appears to be no paperwork behind it at all."

"I'm happy enough," Michitaka said.

"There are some new developments in the case - your accuser has been making very wild statements in public. He says you've been sending evil spirits to terrify him at night. Really, this isn't something to laugh at."

"I do apologise," Michitaka said, still grinning broadly. "Please, go on."

"If he keeps this up - and I should say his remarks have already appeared in some of the less reputable newspapers - I think we will very well be able to challenge the whole case as something dreamt up by a lunatic. The evidence against you is circumstantial in the first place."

"Thank you," Michitaka said. "Please, use any 'new tricks' you can think of." He smiled at his lawyer's puzzlement. "I'm sorry, it's from an English saying a friend told me."

Five days later, all the charges against him were dropped and he was released, an innocent man.

* * *

Michitaka waited, freshly shaved, hair washed with his own shampoo, dressed in his own, freshly-laundered clothes. He looked out at the tea-house's garden and felt more like himself than he had for weeks.

"I'm sorry I'm a little late."

He looked up at Kiyoi's slim form, neatly clad in a suit as good-quality as his own, at the shy, polite smile and the shy, downcast gaze.

"It's good to see you."

Kiyoi folded himself down opposite, and took the cup of tea Michitaka poured.

"Delicious," he said quietly, and looked out at the garden. "How good it is to see you back to yourself, Michitaka-san."

"Thanks to you. What did you do?"

"Some of the tricks were very old," Kiyoi said. "You will have read, I'm sure, of how that person's sad madness led him to accuse a respectable man such as yourself of unlikely crimes. I tried always to be polite and reasonable in my dealings with him, but I cannot say the same for the others. Ageha has a regrettable taste for the sensational, while Makoto-kun is too easily led." He smiled into his tea-cup. "Though I think it was perhaps Masazaku who had the most striking results. He really doesn't like rapists."

Michitaka sipped his own tea, imagining what it might be like if the vampire visiting in the night did not have kind intentions. He found no sympathy in himself at all.

"And some of the tricks were newer and, I think, need to be forgiven by you." Kiyoi looked apologetic as he went on, "I'm afraid we broke into your office, Michitaka-san, and hacked into your computer."

"You hacked into my computer?" Michitaka said.

"Well, the children did. I'm afraid that when it comes to using computers and electrical goods, I always rely on Ageha. I'm afraid that's not quite all - there were indications that what I wanted might have been kept at your house, so we broke into your home also." He grimaced as if the words were too vulgar to think, let alone to say.

"You broke into my house?" Michitaka said, beginning to laugh. 

Kiyoi looked more than a little discomfited. "I wouldn't have done it if I didn't have to, Michitaka-san. It was all most embarrassing - what if your parents had found me? Your father already thinks I'm a monster; I really don't want him to think I'm a criminal as well. But I got what I wanted, and then I could help you." He poured two fresh cups of tea. "Michitaka-san," he said carefully, "We help you catch people the police cannot or will not pursue. You have information on highly placed police officers and judges who are corrupt, who must be avoided. Once it was becoming clear that your accuser could be seen as mentally unstable, I went to one such judge - one of those appointed in your case - with manufactured evidence of your innocence, and with genuine evidence of his own corruption. He saw reason quickly enough. It was easy to have your conditions improved, and after enough time for the evidence to appear to come naturally to light, for the case to be dropped."

"But I'm not a criminal," Michitaka said. "I'm not like the filth we pursue! I hate corruption - "

"Michitaka-san," Kiyoi said, "Forgive me."

"What evidence did you concoct?" Michitaka said. He could feel his normal self returning, could feel the world settling into its rightful configuration about him.

Kiyoi's gaze met his for the briefest moment, then slid down, back to the table and the cups of tea. "Forgive me," he said again. "I persuaded witnesses to change their stories. One witness was very convincing in her statement that at the time you supposedly had the accuser abducted and assaulted, he was in fact assaulting her. I don't think his high-placed family can stop him being tried, Michitaka-san."

"The victims," Michitaka breathed. "Did you _persuade_ them or _threaten_ them?"

"I promised to take care of you, to help you," Kiyoi said haltingly. "For ten years of that time, I avoided you as if you were the cause of my unhappiness. I hope I am better at keeping my promise now - I will never not help you, Michitaka-san."

He was embarrassed, Michitaka saw, almost knocking over his cup as he reached for it. He looked more like a gentle, shy young man than ever, too unsure of himself to even look his conversation partner straight in the face. Michitaka closed his eyes for a moment, remembering the darkness and Kiyoi's ease. _That was what Grandfather had known and had trusted_ , he thought. His grandfather had been a good judge of character, he had to go on believing that.

"You're too good a person to frighten someone who has already been hurt," he said. "You were just seeking justice for me and for them."

The worry in Kiyoi's face drained away, and he made an exaggerated sigh of relief, as if he thought it the proper response to such a situation. "I'm glad," he said. "I'm glad you trust me."

"You've never let me down," Michitaka said.

Kiyoi smiled gently, though he still did not quite look Michitaka in the face. It was enough, Michitaka thought. If he could not have the friendship his grandfather had had, well, he didn't need it for his work. Both he and Kiyoi profited from their acquaintance, neither of them had any need or want of more. They sat in companionable silence, drinking their tea as they looked out at the peaceful garden, each of them content in their place on either side of the dark, polished table. 

 


End file.
